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“The agrichemicals industry is most likely responsible for more death and disease than the combined efforts of the tobacco companies ever were.”

The agrichemicals industry wallows like an overblown hog in a cesspool of corruption. With its snout firmly embedded in the

trough of corporate pro t to the detriment of all else, it is most likely responsible for more death and disease than the combined e orts of the tobacco companies ever were. It indulges in criminality that hides behind corporate public relations,1 media misrepre- sentations,2 and the subversion3 of respect- able-sounding agencies that masquerade as public institutions.

Iwould like to brie y describe how Katherine Carroll, Executive Director of the National Health Federation, came to nd my Open Letter to the

Global Pesticide Regulatory Authorities and the UK and U.S. Media. Colin Todhunter, one of a group of fearless freelance journalists who write articles in the alternative media exposing scandals, had written about my article. I had posted it on my Academia Edu website and Katherine Carroll got in touch. She explained to me that NHF is the oldest health-freedom organization in the World, founded in 1955, and the only one with a seat at Codex where guidelines and stan- dards are set for the World. NHF was pre- paring to attend the Codex Committee on Pesticide Residues in Beijing in April 2017 and Katherine suggested pooling informa- tion; that it would be very helpful.

Merchant Accounts are getting hard to come by these days, as Bankers squeeze supplement companies

According to Whole Foods Maga- zine, health-food stores in 2016 enjoyed another growth year for their business. This one-of-

a-kind magazine has surveyed independent natural products retailers about their sales, profits, and expenditures for more than 39 years and its most recent survey shows 2016 independent retail sales up by more than 50 percent over 2015 sales.1 So, if business is good, why are some businesses complaining?

We all know that having a merchant ac- count is critical for both online and brick- and-mortar stores. In fact, before a store even opens its doors or website, it must open a merchant account rst if it wants to accept debit or credit cards in payment.2 In the case of online businesses, payments are made almost entirely through credit cards or debit cards and a payment gateway (which veri es that a customer actually has the funds that he or she says they have) is what allows the customer to make that pay- ment. With each transaction, the customer’s payment goes into a temporary holding account before it is then transferred on ei- ther a daily or weekly basis into the online store’s own bank account. The temporary account is called a merchant account.

The problem, however, lies not just in nding an a ordable bank or merchant-ac- count provider and then opening a mer- chant account but in keeping it open once you have one. It seems that bankers and merchant-account providers do not like the dietary-supplement industry.

Our Problem

Despite supplements’ very impressive safety record – a record that makes taking FDA-approved drugs and eating USDA-cer- ti ed foods look like you are jumping out of a plane without a parachute – the medical and disease-care establishment, which in- sidiously percolates throughout our entire economic structure, dictates that dietary supplements are “pseudo-pharmaceuti- cals” that are dangerous, unregulated, and not to be trusted. Banks in turn take their cues from this silly disinformation and thus rate any businesses selling dietary supple- ments as “high risk.” So, they are classi ed right up there with other high-risk busi- nesses such as porn sites, 1-800-type chat sites, and risqué women’s lingerie.3

Unfortunately, all too often, the result of being painted with this “high risk” tar brush is a sudden and abrupt rupture in merchant-account services when the igno- rant provider suddenly “discovers” that the business’ website has “unapproved” (by them) health claims. I say ignorant because usually the provider’s health-claims reviewer has only the barest sketch of an idea of what claims are truly legitimate or not. These ruptures in service usually go something like the following stories.

A gentleman with the initials KS posted the following story online: “After boot- strapping my new store with a lot of blood, sweat and tears for 3 months, I have now been informed by a gentleman in manage- ment that I cannot use the Shopify payment gateway to process debit/credit cards be- cause I am in violation of the TOS [Terms of Service]. He referred me to section B5 for “Prohibited Businesses” which reads: ‘Any product, service or activity that is deceptive, unfair, predatory or prohibited by one or more Card Networks.’

“Apparently vitamins, herbs, supple- ments, botanicals, etc. fall under the cat- egory ‘pseudo-pharmaceuticals’ which is ‘prohibited by one or more Card Networks.’ Now, my only option is to make a merchant account through my bank and use Autho- rize.net which conveniently charges a $49 set up fee and a $25/month gateway fee. I am extremely unhappy with this turn of events for a few reasons:

“1) You would think that the term “pseudo-pharmaceuticals” would be men- tioned under the long list of items in the TOS because you can read it until you’re blue in the face and nowhere does it men- tion any of the items I sell.

“2) You would think that Shopify, being such a popular platform, would have had other shop owners selling similar items and would have let me know upfront that this gateway isn’t an option instead of letting me set it all up and then ban me after I make my rst sale.

“3) You would think that having a list of prohibited item from guns, to tobacco, to timeshares, that they could throw in Vita- min B or Chia Seed Oil, after all the possi- ble liability from selling those items must be though the roof.

“Now, I am left with the prospect of moving my store to another platform be- cause as a new entrepreneur I can’t a ord to basically double my monthly expense just because Shopify wasn’t clear on their TOS. It seems the only ‘deceptive’ service was from Shopify. Had I known that to have a store with full payment gateway options was going to cost me $54/month instead of the basic $29/month plan, then I wouldn’t have wasted 3 months and 100s of hours of time on Shopify in the rst place. And a nal word, sorry for my rant, and yes I understand risk management, but the TOS is unacceptable.“

Health-researcher and author Bill Sardi recounts another horror story, “A dietary supplement company that had been doing business for over a decade online was in the middle of a December 2015 year-end sale when it ran out of the product. With the consent of consumers who wanted year-end pricing, orders were taken but not processed and a promise to ship in mid-Jan- uary 2016 was o ered.

“Three weeks went by before the com- pany could resume shipping. When they did, the huge jump in sales volume to make up for back orders caught the eye of a bank merchant account auditor. The merchant account service that processes all the online

“They are criminalizing the successful sale of dietary supplements arbitrarily via the online merchant rather than a regulatory agency.”

orders for this business called the company in question and wanted to know why the company was suddenly selling so much product.

“The bank, one of the biggest in the World, thought something fraudulent was going on and gave the vitamin company 10 days to nd another merchant account be- fore they would pull the plug. The dietary supplement company appealed but the bank merchant account service said they had reviewed the company’s website and found unsubstantiated advertising claims but refused to identify them. Their decision was nal. The company had been in good standing for over a decade and had never received a correction letter from the FDA or FTC.”4

As Sardi so aptly put it, “They are crim- inalizing the successful sale of dietary sup- plements arbitrarily via the online merchant rather than a regulatory agency.” I agree.

Sadly enough, these stories are just two of many. And they do not even take into account those start-up dietary-supplement businesses who applied for merchant ac- counts only to be turned down at because they were launching a “high risk” enter- prise.

Despite the pressure put by banks upon online and physical dietary-supplement and other such businesses, the merchant-ac- count business is still sufficiently com- petitive for businesses to be able to shop around, negotiate, and obtain better terms and conditions.

Possible Alternative Solutions

For those who absolutely cannot get reasonable merchant accounts, eChecks might be an alternative solution, or even an additional solution. In particular, many businesses are using Green Money (http:// www.green.money/echeck) for this online payment option for their customers. Along with Bitcoin and other crypto-currencies, this approach for making secure, online payments is growing rapidly.

Overall, in the United States, online sales of dietary supplements represent 15.5% of overall sales and are climbing. Still, according to Bill Sardi, new online supple- ment companies “are scrambling to nd merchant account services that will accept their business.”5

As you have seen, solutions exist; but be aware that those who fear the online sup- plement industry are trying to dismantle it one vendor at a time. And by doing so, they are also attacking us, the consumers. Cut- ting o the lines of supply is the oldest trick in warfare and the supplement industry is in a war promulgated by the pharmaceuti- cal industry and its government hatchmen. Dietary-supplement businesses can ght back by using the free market to nd com- petitive bids for their merchant accounts and by running a clean business that is be- yond reproach.

If you search the Amazon website for books about coconut oil, you will encounter a list of at least 70 books and counting. Many of the books claim various health bene ts for

coconut oil, which I am not denying are likely true.

However, the biggest best sellers in the category are by Bruce Fife with his series of Coconut Oil Miracle books. The books by Dr. Mary Newport also suggest that co- conut oil can be used to treat Alzheimer’s disease, where she recounts a number of amazing case studies including one about her husband.

Are the Bene ts from its Chain Length?

What most, if not all, of these books have in common is that they suggest coco- nut oil’s health bene ts come from the fact that coconut oil consists mainly of medi- um-length chains of fatty acids (MFAs).

The theory is that somehow the body can process MFAs much more easily than the longer-chain fatty acids that are found in vegetable oils such as olive oil; and that these MFAs are readily converted to ke- tones, which the brain cells can more e ec- tively use as fuel. The underlying theory as to how ketones help Alzheimer’s patients is that supposedly their brain cells have a problem utilizing glucose as fuel while ke- tones are much more easily used as energy. Not likely if you ask me!

Or Is Alzheimer’s Helped by Other Means?

I was always suspicious of the ketone idea, especially given that coconut oil seems to dramatically help Alzheimer’s pa- tients. You see, I am the author of a book about other treatments that have been found to work on Alzheimer’s patients. My book is titled Alzheimer’s Treatments That Actually Worked In Small Studies! (Based On New, Cutting-Edge, Correct Theory!) That Will Never Be Tested & You Will Never Hear About From Your MD Or Big Pharma!

Big Pharma would rather continue sell- ing drugs that have basically no e ect at all, such as Aricept and Namenda, at high pric- es to make high pro ts rather than promote something that is e ective but unpro table.

As it turns out, the naturally-occurring human hormone melatonin, which declines with age, seems to have the e ect of halting or even reversing Alzheimer’s as will be de- scribed shortly. Another substance that has been found to positively alter the course of Alzheimer’s is Lupron, which acts by sup- pressing the two human hormones FSH and LH, which increase with age.

Melatonin will never be studied by the large pharmaceutical companies in a big, expensive trial because it cannot be patented and thus generate any pro ts. What are the indications that melatonin works in treating Alzheimer’s? First, there was a mouse study of Alzheimer’s that showed that melatonin plus exercise re- versed Alzheimer-like symptoms. There is another case study out of Brazil of two identical twins who got Alzheimer’s at the same time. One took 6 mg of melatonin per night to sleep, the other did not. The mel- atonin-taking twin’s illness did not prog-

ress over a several-year period while the non-melatonin taking twin declined rapid- ly to the point he could barely hold his head up or speak.

And nally, there was a recent trial at the Buck Institute of Aging out of UCLA where they reversed early Alzheimer’s in a group of ten patients with a complicated protocol of many di erent vitamins and supplements, one of which was melatonin.

So, because of these facts, I have always suspected that if coconut oil had any e ect on Alzheimer’s patients, then it had to be at the hormonal level and likely had noth- ing to do with the length of the fatty-acid chain involved. I will touch on this more at the end of the article where a great surprise awaits you.

The Ketogenic Diet

Now let’s take a look at the ketogenic diet as being helpful in Alzheimer’s. Is this a real phenomenon?

There are two ways to boost ketones – a high-fat, low-carbohydrate diet, or a pro- longed period of fasting where your body breaks down and releases its own fats into the blood for energy.

A study in mice showed that a high-fat diet does reduce amyloid beta, but it did not improve Alzheimer’s-like behaviors in mice. But how did they generate the ke- tones? Not by reduced calories from fasting, but rather from feeding them a high- fat, low-carbohydrate diet.

I believe that you need to reduce calories to most evectively alter hormone levels. It is the changes in hormones from fasting and the ketogenic diet that I expect are actu- ally bene ting Alzheimer’s patients.

Although the research in this area is spotty at best, there is some evidence that producing ketones by fasting bene cially al- ters hormones more substantially than just by pursuing a high-fat diet. I say this with the caveat that there might be a few unique fats such as coconut oil that may also confer some of the bene ts of a fasting diet on Alz- heimer’s su erers.

Fasting

Why do I believe a fasting diet should be the best way to treat Alzheimer’s as opposed to a high-fat diet? It has nothing to do with ketones. What it has to do with are the dra- matic hormone changes that one experiences while fasting.

In my 1998 paper on aging and hor- mones, I describe what happens to your hormones after ve days of fasting. Keep in mind that fasting is similar to short-term caloric restriction, and caloric restriction has been shown to extend the mean and maxi- mum life span of mice by up to 40%!

Here is what I wrote then, which is just as applicable today:

“Melatonin: the famine and drought hormone. During famine conditions or ca- loric restriction one would expect that in addition to the increase in cGMP activity, that an increase in cGMP stimulating hormones would be seen. Also, one would expect a de- cline in cAMP stimulating hormones. In a study of human males undergoing 5 days of fasting, the following hormone level changes were seen ... :

Testosterone decreased 50% - unexpected.” With all these considerations in mind, and my extreme doubts about the validity of the coconut oil/ketone hypothesis, I was able to convince a 30-year-old male acquain- tance of mine who had never taken any vitamins or supplements to volunteer for an experiment. His levels of the hormones pregnenolone, progesterone, and Vitamin D3 were tested. He was then asked to eat three tablespoons of coconut oil per day for one month. At that time, his hormones were tested again. To my surprise his progester- one did not change signi cantly, nor did his Vitamin D3. However, to my even greater surprise, his pregnenolone levels increased by 250%! (Unfortunately there was no test available for melatonin as blood has to be drawn a few hours after sleep to determine

the nighty time peak.)

Pregnenolone and Melatonin

Given that pregnenolone is often de- scribed as “the memory hormone,” can be easily converted to progesterone in the body, and has been shown in studies to improve the memories of old rats to the equivalent of young rats, we can start to see the real reason why coconut oil might be helping Alzheimer’s patients. The real mechanism of action is likely not ketones, but hormone changes. Elevated ketones I believe are just a side e ect of fasting or a ketogenic diet. The real medicinal agents are the associated hor- mone changes.

So how does melatonin t in with all these facts? It turns out that taking mela- tonin will signi cantly boost one’s proges- terone levels. Similar to pregnenolone, pro- gesterone is good for the brain and is known as one of the most neuroprotective substanc- es known to man.

Additional interesting facts – fasting in the past was used to treat epilepsy, and also there are a number of case studies where pregnenolone provided dramatic relief for some people with intractable epilepsy. Al- though there is no research on this that I can nd, I would expect that fasting will be found to cause a large increase in one’s pregnenolone levels.

Coconut Oil is Easy to Eat

And, nally, eating coconut oil is not dif- cult at all. In fact, if you sprinkle a little salt on it, it tastes very much like butter. I person- ally enjoy a bagel with coconut oil and salt with cherry preserves many mornings. I have also switched to using coconut oil for all my cooking, and even gured out how to make a very healthy coconut-oil popcorn snack by placing several spoonfuls of coconut oil in a large bowl, sprinkling in a layer of popcorn and covering the bowl with a paper plate and two rubber bands and cooking for 3-1⁄2 min- utes. Delicious. Enjoy!